Nathan turned 13 on April 18th. He is a hard working, conscientious young man who loves animals of all types.
Do, for his “big 13″ birthday, we got him a horse.
Sapphire is a “Racking horse” and is “gaited”, so she has a smooooth ride. The intent is that one could ride for hours without getting beat to death in the saddle.
She is a gorgeous horse, and not easily spooked. Here are some pictures of Sam, Nathan, and even Marilyn with Sapphire.
We spent over 4 years building up our soil, only to have Johnson grass start taking it over. This last year, we had a lot of Johnson grass, so we decided to do raised beds and smother out the Johnson grass.
If any of you know wabout Johnson grass, you know that it is pervasive and nearly impossible to get rid of.
You can’t burn it out (it seems to like that and causes it to propagate), dig it out (it spreads by seed and by roots – so, if you dig it and break off the tiniest piece, it spreads), pull it out, and as far as we know there isn’t a weed killer that will destroy it – and we REFUSE to use any weed killer.
So our only recourse was to build raised beds on top of it, using weed barrier underneath to smother it.
Starting in February, I built bed frames from 2×6 wood and made the frames 4ft wide x 12ft long. I also put in a 48ft long x 1ft wide x 1ft tall bed for the potatoes,and two more 1ft wide x 1ft tall beds – one 24 ft long and one 10ft long.
By the end of April, I had 15 beds finished and Marilyn had them all pretty much planted. Below are the beds before planting/mulching and what it looks like now, at the end of April. I still have 15 beds to put in over the next 2 weeks, so you can imagine how much we can grow!
Today, federal district Judge Jeffrey White of the Northern District of California denied a request by a coalition of organic seed growers, and conservation and food safety groups seeking a temporary ban on genetically engineered GE sugar beets and sugar beet seeds. While Judge White denied the preliminary injunction, he indicated that permanent relief is likely forthcoming: “The parties should not assume that the Court’s decision to deny a preliminary injunction is indicative of its views on a permanent injunction pending the full environmental review that APHIS [Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service] is required to do.” The court further explained: “While the environmental review is pending, the Court is inclined to order the Intervenor-Defendants to take all efforts … to use conventional [non-GE] seed.”Add to FacebookAdd to DiggAdd to Del.icio.usAdd to StumbleuponAdd to RedditAdd to BlinklistAdd to TwitterAdd to TechnoratiAdd to Yahoo BuzzAdd to NewsvineThe coalition’s motion for preliminary injunction, brought by Center for Food Safety and Earthjustice attorneys, called for a moratorium on all planting, production and use of the genetically modified seeds and beets until the court could consider a permanent remedy to the government’s unlawful deregulation of the crop. The coalition will argue for a permanent injunction at a hearing in July.
via Court Rules in GMO Sugar Beet Case « The True Food Network.
Well,
I had fully intended to get my Warre Top Bar hives built before the bee season this year. Maybe next year – or, maybe I can get 1 or 2 built and by nucs in May…
I installed 6 packages of bees Sunday afternoon.
I’m getting pretty fast at it -It took all of about 5 minutes for the first one, and around 2 – 3 minutes for the other 5.
I fed them pollen patties yesterday. I have 2 1-gallon “community” feeders set up with sugar-water, to help them pull wax, and to stimulate laying in the queen. They were installed in hives that had pulled comb on the foundation for all or, at least for 7 of the 10 frames, so they have a head start there.
I intend to pull honey off of these hives, so I will be installing individual feeders on each hive this week, along with queen excluders and supers with empty frames (foundation only – no “pulled comb) so the bees can pull comb. If they can get that done by May 1st – 10th, I should be in business, and will pull the feeders off and add additional supers that have pulled comb. That way, then will have plenty of room for putting up honey. This helps me in 2 ways:
1. The bees will be less likely to swarm, since they have the entire brood box for brood, and 2 supers for storing honey.
2. They will have supers with comb – so all they have to do is put the nectar in the cells and start making honey out of it.
We are planting lots and lots of Anise Hyssop (Agastache foeniculum). It is said that 1 acre of anise hyssop can supply 100 beehives with enough nectar to put up 100 pounds of surplus honey per hive. With my 7 bee hives, we should do well.
We are also planting a bee-friendly flower garden, and have some clover in. All of these plants should boost the “nectar economy” and, hopefully will provide enough stores for my bees to overwinter well. Since most of the farms are no longer here, it has been a struggle to support more than 4 hives here with the amount of bloom that has been available.
Add to that the 125 blueberry plants we have, (which will bloom in July) the several hundred strawberries, 40 plus fruit trees, and we could have a good year.
And if the black locust blooms this May, we’ll have a bumper crop of honey!!!
Here’s to a successful beekeeping year!
–Pat
I have made 14 of the 28 raised beds frames and put them in the garden area.
Some of those are already populated with leeks, broccoli, pea seeds, lettuce seeds and other seeds.
We intend to put out potatoes this weekend (Easter weekend).
Garlic is in, strawberries are peeking out from under the winter straw/hay mulch covering.
I still have to mulch and fertilize the fruit trees, and blueberries, and fertilize the asparagus and strawberries.
Tomatoes, peppers and other plants are started in the basement to be transplanted into the garden beds after the dangers of the last frost have past.
Things are progressing slowly, but with the last frost around April 15th, we are ahead of the game.
An article in The Seattle Times (link below ) indicates that there is a lot of food “tainting” and blatant lying going on.
In the article, the writer eludes to the fact that honey may be diluted with sugar beet or corn syrup, or that the “Sheep’s milk cheese” is actually made from cow’s milk.
The FDA is trying to figure out how to crack down on this.
I would say (and have often said in this blog and in newsletters):
Get to know a local farmer. Buy from a local farmer, or farmers that you have come to know and trust. Ask them how they grow their crops.
Nation & World | At U.S. dinner tables, the food may be a fraud | Seattle Times Newspaper.
It’s that time of year again.
We are currently building raised garden beds, planting in the beds, building more beds, planting in the beds.
All the while, we are milking goats and milking the cow.
That of course, creates more work, since we have to make cheese, butter, sour cream, ice cream, yogurt and freeze milk.
And of course, we have to feed the animals 2 – 3 times a day and check their water. Plus, we have to feed the bees sugar syrup so that they will ramp up in numbers and make wax. And we have to feed them pollen so the queen will lay more eggs.
And we have to plant more bee-friendly trees, flowers, clover. Plus we have to prune the fruit trees (Sam and I have done most of them already), and repair the driveway, finish remodeling the porch, clean up and spruce up the house.
And on and on and on…
But we get to eat the honey, and the fruit, and the cheeses, yogurt, sour cream, ice cream, and drink the milk and eat the veggies, and berries.
And we get to share it with friends and family…
Kind of makes it all worth while…
Baby goats hopping all over, bees flying around the bee yard (apiary), cow and dairy goats in milk.
The list goes on, but these are the first signs of life after a long winter.
About 2 weeks ago, on a Sunday, my bees were flying all over trying to find food. I fed the hives and thought how wonderful spring will be… If the hives take off, we’ll have lots of honey. Of course, I have o do my fair share… I have to feed pollen patties and sugar water now, if I want that queen laying lots of eggs. And I want that queen laying lots of eggs NOW! In 2 months the honey flow will most likely be on, so I want a bunch of field bees out there collecting nectar for honey.
We had twins from a goat that weekend, and last week, we had 3 goats kid. So, we are up to 6 baby goats jumping and running all over the place. We have 2 more due in April, so that will bring us up to anywhere from 8 to 10 kids!
Although it is good news that Monsanto pulled this variant of GM (genetically Modified) corn, it is disturbing that it was done in secrecy.
All documentation was pulled by Monsanto, and there was no press release by wither the regulators or the “applicant” (Monsanto) and all evidence of testing has been pulled as well. No paper trail of any kind left behind.
Also, you won’t find this on in the news bytes from any of the major US media moguls.
It seems that there is a “kiss and don’t tell” attitude where high-powered, mega-rich corporations are adored and catered to by the press (advertising revenue) at the sake of the safety and well being of the general public. We truly live in a nation that now bows to the idols of fame, fortune and power at the expense of the rest of society.
You may read the entire article here:
http://www.gmfreecymru.org/news/Press_Notice9Nov2009.htm